


[Fandom stats] A study in Sherlockian shipping across different platforms

by toastystats (destinationtoast)



Series: Fandom Stats [11]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Fanwork Research & Reference Guides, Meta, Nonfiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-19
Updated: 2013-06-19
Packaged: 2019-09-19 21:38:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17009676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/destinationtoast/pseuds/toastystats
Summary: Shipping on AO3, FFN, and Tumblr, as of June 2013.





	[Fandom stats] A study in Sherlockian shipping across different platforms

**Author's Note:**

> Originally [posted on Tumblr](http://destinationtoast.tumblr.com/post/53420355869/how-does-the-sherlock-fandom-vary-across). Note that the numbers of fanworks used here are extremely small, and so all graphs should be taken with a huge grain of salt.

[](https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNfIAP2nBhjNxva3s1oYWyv_nDghuCmNa8INN4wE96IKzjWYKtksd627_5d-6cisA/photo/AF1QipNbqAqX7avmjjJ7TpPkzf73M1-WQZHB8gWM9vnk?key=UzBPVlZCQ3p1S1VnWHVkM2tDR3lQNGs2VmRBM3BR)

[](https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNfIAP2nBhjNxva3s1oYWyv_nDghuCmNa8INN4wE96IKzjWYKtksd627_5d-6cisA/photo/AF1QipNjFJWsc1P5s9JvM5z9XjwFYFcHV0qZ32cfNMJp?key=UzBPVlZCQ3p1S1VnWHVkM2tDR3lQNGs2VmRBM3BR)

[](https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNfIAP2nBhjNxva3s1oYWyv_nDghuCmNa8INN4wE96IKzjWYKtksd627_5d-6cisA/photo/AF1QipNj7PFfPUR4MbPq6uW0wda9IAmgudpVKs-o9Nby?key=UzBPVlZCQ3p1S1VnWHVkM2tDR3lQNGs2VmRBM3BR)

**How does the Sherlock fandom vary across platforms?  A study in shipping.**

**Update:** when I've repeated this analysis, I've gotten a great deal of variance, so take this with a large grain of salt.  Please see my more recent [BASC Sherlockian stats presentation](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2076084) and my [other Sherlockian analyses](http://destinationtoast.tumblr.com/stats#sherlockian) for more updated work.

Partly as a follow-up to my post about [slash in the _Sherlock_ fandom](http://destinationtoast.tumblr.com/post/53085607366/this-one-goes-out-to-the-makers-and-listeners-of), I decided to try to compare the amount of shipping (and, in particular, Johnlock shipping) on Archive Of Our Own, Fanfiction.net, and on Tumblr.  

**Methodology**

In order to compare, I looked at the first 100 stories in the _Sherlock (TV)_ category in the fanfiction archives, and the first 100 posts in the #sherlock tag on Tumblr.  I discarded all posts that weren't actually relevant to _Sherlock_ or weren't unique (this was only relevant for Tumblr).  Then I tallied the primary ship for each item.  (This is a different comparison from my last AO3 analysis, wherein if a story contained Johnlock and Mystrade, it got counted in both categories; here, I only counted the primary ship in each case.)  In most cases, the primary ship was clear; in one case of a John/Sherlock/Lestrade fic, I counted it as "other".  

 _ **Note:** _This method of sampling is strongly biased toward whatever happens to be trendy at this moment, as all the items I sampled were posted on June 19, 2013.  Results should not be generalized from too strongly, but should give a rough idea of differences between the platforms.

**Conclusions**

The AO3 _Sherlock_ fandom is heavily biased toward slash, and toward Johnlock in particular.  Most of the "other" pairs were other slash pairings.  (Mystrade showed up slightly more than Sherlolly, but I didn't note it as a separate category, because it was often a secondary pairing in a Johnlock-focused story.)

The FFN  _Sherlock_ fandom has a lot more Sherlolly and a lot more Sherlock/Original Female Character than the other platforms.  There is also more Gen fic here than any other category.  However, out of all the ships, Johnlock still predominates by a ratio of 3:1 over the next most popular ship -- and there is more Johnlock than all other ships combined.

The Tumblr tag is mostly just about the show  _Sherlock_  without focusing on ships,and a bunch of the fanart, gifs, and roleplays are non-shippy as well.  However, where shipping occurs, Johnlock again swamps all other ships.  

I feel most dissatisfied with the Tumblr analysis (it feels the least useful/revealing), and would like to think about how to better sample & analyze fandom on this platform.  If you have ideas, drop me a line.

 **Update:** In a [followup post](http://destinationtoast.tumblr.com/post/53603922297/exponential63-reblogged-my-post-on-how-the), reader exponential63 made some excellent suggestions for improving this analysis, and I explained my reasoning and methodology a bit more (as well as its limitations).

**Author's Note:**

> Comments welcome, but I’m in the middle of a massive fandom stats backup due to Tumblr purge, so I may be slow to respond.


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